St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1887-11-26

= W. f. ff'' ss'S 'se
fact that he
had his hands in his trousers pockets
had been noticed by anyone acquainted
in that country, that observer would
have declared the young man a stranger,
or, if a resident, very eccentric one
at least. Assiniboia is so little known
to the most of US that even the name
sounds strangely, but it should not,
for that great province of Canada is
merely an extension of our own prairie
land, and, had that young man chosen to
do so, he could have turned to the south
and walked to the United States border
In fifteen or sixteen hours, were his
strength sufficient for the task He was
mot stranger, though his hands were
deep in his pockets, where hands in a
pioneer country have little time for stay
ing. He had been there two years, and
was landlord of half section of land
nearby, on the edge of the Pipestone valley
"a long and narrow valley inclosing a
winding stream of crystal clearness and
quite an extraordinary number of houses
For SO new a country; valley, more
over, which good judges have proclaimed
the prettiest part of the Northwest terri
tories
A tall and handsome youth he was,
whose clothing, coarse and worn, and
making no pretense to style, draped him
as the most fashionable garments fail to
do when worn by awkward and ungainly
men. 1t could not be said that his clothes
made him graceful and easy in his bear
ing, for that he was and would be in
whatever he wore. They simply failed
to hide those qualities. Sometimes he
kept to the trail-a mere footpath on the
plain-and sometimes he strayed from it
and bent the grass beneath his tread
Frequently he shielded his eyes with his
right hand and scanned the plain, always
to the eastward. If he had been an en-
thusiast, drinking in the beauty of the
scene that lay before him, no one with
grain of taste for scenic loneliness could
have blamed him. Just there the prairie
is scarcely monotonous at ALL The land
is rolling, precisely as though it really is
"a sea of grass" as it has been often
called, and as though just here the sea
was troubled and wind-swept and stormy.
And though it is none the less grassy
plain of brown grass and green grass, |
beautifully alternating, still there are
many trees just here by the Pipestone-
clumps of poplar and wolf-willow, and |
even here and there tiny grove of these
trees rising from tangle of under
brush.
But it was another sort of beauty he |
would fain to enjoy-the beauty of a
maiden whom he knew and half ex-
pected to see. And his mind turned |
back to that day when, as newcomer,
he had been walking just about where
he now pursued his way, and in passing
O "coolie," or little depression between
two mounds, had been halted by a
quartet of Indians from the reserva-
ton nearby. They surrounded him
and demanded "whiskey" and money"
some uttering one word and some
another. 1t would be an untruth to say
that he was not frightened. Brave as he
knew himself to be, he felt that this was
@ trying situation, for all the Indians
were then in one of their uneasy moods,
rebellion and constantly
committing petty breaches of the laws
OF their reservation and of the white
men around it. He had no weapon,
and he would have met death
rather than yield to the only de-
mand of theirs he could comply
with-that for money. He motioned the
vagabonds aside and endeavored to pass
by them, but they blocked his way and
him. He seized one of them,
lifted him as a man might lift baby, and |
flung him violently upon the ground. 1t |
was mad act for an unarmed man op-
posing four savages on lonely prairie, |
and no one knows what might not have |
happened except that, just at that in
slant, clear ringing "Halloo p sounded |
close at hand. There was a rattle of |
hoofs and woman on horseback rode |
up to the group. The red men fell back
and hung their heads as she talked to
them, angrily, in their own language.
The white man understood nothing until |
she motioned to the Indians to 20, and |
then he comprehended only the gesture
The Indians skunk away.
"Never strike an Indian except to kill |
him. said she authoritatively and with
some sharpness in her tone. as she turned
toward the white youth, land never kill
an Indian unless it must be done. In
this case had you commanded these fell
lows to leave you as I have just done,
even in English, thew would have done
is, if you eally looked as if
you meant it."
The girl was not day older than the
youth. Both appeared to be about
twenty-one or twenty-five. Yet she
talked to him as if she were a woman
and he child.
"Ysu are the stranger from up by the
ALLEY, amt 49," she added, and then |